Question 22:
What is the sinfulness of that condition into which all mankind has
fallen?
The sinfulness of the condition into which all mankind
fell is the guilt of Adam's first sin, the lack of original righteousness, and
the corruption of our whole nature (which is commonly called original sin),
together with all actual transgressions which come from this nature.
DAY
1: Romans 3:10
Paul in writing in Romans 3 is attempting to put in perspective
the proper thinking about the righteousness of God and the proper aspect of
man’s sinfulness. He is interested in
making sure that those he is writing to understand that there is no difference
between the Jew and the Gentile before God.
They are both sinners (vs. 9).
Paul does however ask some questions and draws from the Old Testament to
answer them, including the passage of verse 10.
Paul starts by asking if the
Jews had an advantage. His answer is yes
they did. The were the ones given the
oracles of God. Therefore, their
advantage was that they had the revealed will of God before them. The next question that would logically follow
would be, “Well, some of the Jews did not believe God, wouldn’t that call into
question the faithfulness of God?” It
was not that the Jews didn’t believe that the Scriptures were divine in
nature. They did believe that. Rather it was their unwillingness to believe
to the point where it was mixed with faith, became a reality in their lives,
and thus produced obedience from the heart.
Would that call into question the faithfulness of God and His
words? Paul says that it would not. He says in verse four, “Certainly not!” Rather than impuning the faithfulness of God,
Paul directs the blame towards man. He
says, “Let God be true and every man a liar.”
He then quotes from Psalm 51:4.
We have looked at this passage in the previous question that we
examined. David, in acknowledging his
sin, was also concerned with the integrity and immutability of God’s word. It was clear in his mind that the one whose
faithfulness was shown to be unfaithful was not God’s, but his own.
The question would then arise, “If God’s faithfulness
and His righteousness is magnified in our unfaithfulness, then shouldn’t we
continue to live in unbelief?” Paul says
a resounding “No!” It is a parallel to
the question, “Should we sin so that grace may abound?” What is Paul’s reasoning here? He is concerned that this kind of perverted
thinking will cause one to look at God as unjust and attempt to say that His
wrath isn’t justified because we cause His righteousness to abound by our
sinning. This could not be farther from
the truth. God will judge the world. How will He judge it if not on the condition
of what is righteous and unrighteous?
There must be that which demands a just verdict and a just
punishment. Verse seven asks a similar
question. Why does God still judge us if
our lies continue to cause His truth to abound?
The real problem of the matter comes in verse 8. That is that if we continue in a lifestyle of
practicing sin, then we are in essence communicating to unbelievers that God
does not take sin seriously. We are
saying with our actions that God will not judge sin and that there is no need
for man to be saved from sin. In effect
we would be saying that man really doesn’t have a sin problem, which would lead
others to blaspheme, or take very lightly, our message of the gospel.
However, Paul wants his readers to know that both Jews
and Gentiles are sinners. They have both
missed God’s standards. Though one was
given the oracles of God and the sign of the covenant, they both stand guilty
before God. As a matter of fact, the
Jews stand even more guilty because they were given the divine will in the
pages of Scripture. Paul thus makes an
appeal to what he has previously stated in chapters one and two. That is that all men everywhere are under
sin, whether they are Jew or Gentile.
Paul then quotes from Psalm 14:1. It is a climactic statement that there is
none righteous. Paul uses the word dikaios for righteous. We have seen this word before. It means, “observing divine law, guiltless,
faultless, innocent”. However, another
meaning could best describe the context here and that is “approved of or
acceptable of God”. Though the Jews may
think they are acceptable to God because of their heritage and the Gentiles may
believe they are acceptable to God via all their pagan practices, sacrifices,
and intelligence, Paul tells them that none are righteous… not even one. Many people that I come in contact with
thinks this verse reads, “There is none righteous, no not one…. Except
me.” If they don’t say it with their
mouths, they say it with their life.
Paul tells us that the purpose of law was to shut our mouths of boasting
in our own righteousness (vss. 19-20).
Once that is accomplished, we can see clearly God’s righteousness and
Paul tells us that God’s righteousness was manifested in the person of Jesus
Christ, who was testified to in the Law and the Prophets.
It is faith in Christ and in His righteousness that
is able to deliver the sinner from his sin.
It is the grace of God that is able to bring the sinner to a point where
he is able to believe the gospel of Christ’s redemption (vs. 24).
DAY 2: Ephesians 2:1
Ephesians 2 continues to be one
of my favorite texts of Scripture.
Though we are given just the first verse, I would like to also pick up a
little from the following two verses.
For, taken together that give a clear picture of how those who are under
the curse live and behave.
After completing an incredible first chapter on our
inheritance and we being predestined to it, not of our own merit, but because
of God’s own choosing, Paul then gives quite simply how our salvation came
about and he begins with our sinful state.
He tells us that we were dead in trespasses and sins. We have seen both terms for trespasses and
sins before. Paul uses the Greek words paraptoma and hamartia. To trespass is to
deviate from the right path or to wander.
To sin is to violate the law of God in thought or act. Paul simple wants to affirm that whether we
unconsciously and deliberately disobeyed God we find ourselves in the same
position and that being dead in our sins.
Paul uses the term nekros,
which is not a process of dying, but rather is used to refer to a corpse. The term can also be used spiritually, which
is the case in this passage, where is speaks of those who are dead towards
God. Their life does not recognize and
is not devoted to God. Rather it is
given over to trespasses and sins.
Paul goes on to say that our conduct was overseen by
the prince of the power of the air. Our
enemy Satan is referred to in Scripture as the father of those who are dead in
their sins (cf. John
What does a son of disobedience look like? Verse three tells us. Notice at the end of the verse that we are
this by nature. It is not an evolutionary
process to become sinners, it is a natural occurrence in man. They only process we go through concerning
sin is tweaking it, or becoming worse at it.
We continually think of sin and ways to sin. This is what is referred to in the first part
of the verse. Paul says that our
conversation, or way of life, was consumed by the lusts of the flesh. This phrase speaks to the thought life. Our minds were not fixed on the things of
God. Rather they were consumed with the
desires of our own heart which are set at enmity with God. The second part of our conduct is the
fulfillment of those lusts. We not only
thought about sin, be formed a lifestyle whereby we could obtain the sinful
desires that we had. Though for some of
us, our conscience and the grace of God kept us from being all that we could be
as sinners, we still lived life in the misery of sin. We continued to choose our own path (Isaiah
53:6), instead of following the Way God had laid out. Remember, this is our nature. This is what we do apart from the saving work
of Christ.
DAY
3: Matthew 15:19
The context of this passage is Jesus being confronted
by the scribes and Pharisees about his disciples eating without going through
the ritual of washings, particularly their hands. Two rabbis, Hillell and Shammai, were the two
who instituted this ritual. They not
only wanted a mere washing, but a total immersion of the hands in water before
the partaking of food, except in the case of fruit. Those of the Pharisee persuasion saw these
traditions as even more weighty and bound by duty to obey these kinds of traditions
than the Law and the prophets.
So when Jesus hears them complaining about his
disciples eating without washing their hands, he confronts their own sin. While they are trying to appear holier than
their neighbors, they are really at opposition to the commandments of God. Jesus says that they have exalted their man
made traditions above the commandments of God and proceeds to tell them how
they have done it. Verses 4-6 tell us
that what these guys were guilty of was not honoring their mother and father. It seems obvious that their parents were up
in years and in need of some type of financial help. However, these self righteous men told their
parents that all their money that they could help them with was tied up in the
duties of service to God. They wanted to
appear holy, but they really were committing serious sin. For Jesus told them that the commandment also
carried a punishment of death if not followed.
In verses 7-9 Jesus quotes Isaiah by saying that he
prophesied of these people (the scribes and Pharisees). He called them hypocrites. This was a strong term and if they weren’t
mad with His accusation that they had forsaken the commands of God for the
traditions of men, then they were certainly angry with Him now. The term hypocrites is the Greek word hupokrites,
which means “a stage player, an actor, a pretender”. This had to have been a humiliating
indictment of these religious phonies.
Christ goes on to say that they honor God only with their mouths, but
their worship is really a worship of themselves.
He then calls the multitudes to Himself and begins to
teach them saying that it is not what goes into a man that defiles him, but
what comes out (vs. 11, 18). Food is
simply taken in and even with dirty hands it provides nourishment for the
body. However, when it is processed in
the stomach and then passes from the body, it becomes dirt again. So, this has nothing to do with the moral or
spiritual condition of the person.
Jesus says that the things that the heart produces
sin. It is out of the heart that these
things proceed. These are the very
things that Paul speaks of in general terms in Ephesians 2:1-3. Jesus names seven specific sins that come
from the heart of man: evil thoughts,
murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies. Jesus’ point was that the sin that defiles
men is not able to merely be washed away with water, nor can it be cleansed
through scrubbing or religious rituals.
Jesus’ point was to take His hearers back to the place where they saw
their sinful natures in light of God’s law.
He takes a simpler and more direct approach here rather than an
expositional approach as in Matthew 5-7.
This is the condition of man. His
heart produces only sin. As Christ said,
“The flesh profiteth nothing”. Paul said
the same thing when he said, “For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh)
nothing good dwells; for to will is present with me, but how to perform what is
good I do not find.” May God grant the
next generation the ability to see their inability to wash away their own sin
and plead with God for mercy for Jesus’ sake.
Scripture: Romans 5:19;
3:10; Ephesians 2:1; Isaiah 53:6; Psalm 51:5; Matthew 15:19.
Comment The Bible says
that "in Adam all die" (1 Cor.